Last night in The Apprentice (BBC1), Katie Hopkins, she of the fluttering lashes and forked tongue, reached the final then sensationally resigned. The producers' lawyers threatened me with remedies at law or in equity if I disclosed this. Don't tell them I told you.

Rumour has swirled around Katie for some time. It was suspected that she wanted to win but didn't want to work for Sir Alan Sugar. His three wise monkeys, who interviewed the semi-finalists, soon picked up on this. The head of Viglen told Sugar, "My concern is the girl is totally ruthless. I got the impression a charade was going on. You've got to ask what her motivation is to be the apprentice. She's on £90,000 already. She knew nothing about you."

Sugar's often repeated roar is: "Nobody makes a fool out of me." With Katie around, "Care to bet?" hung unspoken in the air.

By now Katie was sitting alone, unsmiling, staring at her hands, that characteristic scarlet stain on her cheeks. Sugar said, "You don't look like a lady whose just been told you've entered the final." His Russian eyebrows became very circumflex. He seemed to be chewing a gum drop. She said, speaking rather carefully, that she hadn't cleared the move to London with the people who provided the care for her children. Kristina's face was a study in scepticism. "Well, there you go," said Sugar. And, without a word, she went.

Was it a twinge of conscience or a failure of nerve? Whatever it was, it wasn't babysitting.